{"id":27968,"date":"2026-04-15T16:58:31","date_gmt":"2026-04-15T20:58:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/?post_type=story&p=27968"},"modified":"2026-04-15T16:58:33","modified_gmt":"2026-04-15T20:58:33","slug":"clark-researchers-examine-potential-impacts-of-megaport-on-peruvian-amazon","status":"publish","type":"story","link":"https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/2026\/04\/15\/clark-researchers-examine-potential-impacts-of-megaport-on-peruvian-amazon\/","title":{"rendered":"Clark researchers examine potential impacts of \u2018megaport\u2019 on Peruvian Amazon"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n\n


As she nears the end of her undergraduate years at Clark,\u00a0environmental science<\/a>\u00a0major Julia Head \u201926, M.S.\/GIS \u201927, has begun checking off her to-do list.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It includes completing research papers for her classes in the School of Climate, Environment, and Society<\/a>; tackling an honors thesis and final project for her yearlong Human-Environment Research Observatory (HERO) Fellowship<\/a>; participating in rehearsals and performances for the student Variant Dance Troupe; and firming up her post-Commencement plans, including Clark\u2019s 4+1 Accelerated Master\u2019s Degree program in Geographic Information Science (GIS)<\/a> next fall.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And then there is one more task: finishing 10 GIS-based maps to be released worldwide as part of a multinational, multi-institutional research project examining the potential impacts of a Chinese \u201cmegaport\u201d on the Peruvian Amazon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI feel a huge responsibility,\u201d Head says. \u201cI\u2019m very honored to be on this project.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Denise
Denise Humphreys Bebbington<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Led by\u00a0Sustainability and Social Justice<\/a>\u00a0professor and principal investigator\u00a0Denise Humphreys Bebbington<\/a>, the project involves a team of researchers from Clark and Peru. It is funded by a two-year, $920,000\u00a0grant<\/a> from the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

With the Peruvian government\u2019s blessing, the China-based COSCO Shipping company, a state-owned enterprise, began building the Port of Chancay in June 2021, about 50 miles north of Lima.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When completed, the $3 billion-plus megaport could transform trade between South America and Asia. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018Where are those shipments coming from, and which routes are likely to be used?\u2019<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Little information has been shared publicly about the actual costs or goals of the project, which \u201clargely flew under the radar because it was private,\u201d Humphreys Bebbington says. \u201cWhat it is, and what it aspires to be \u2014 there\u2019s a big gap. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt\u2019s potentially the largest deep-water port on the Pacific Coast of South America,\u201d she says. \u201cThis hub port can receive shipments that can be loaded onto Ultra Large Capacity Vessels bound for Shanghai. The big question is: Where are those shipments coming from, and which routes are likely to be used?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Many believe that Peru and Brazil\u2019s governments and private companies might expand and build more roads, railways, and other transport infrastructure to connect the Chancay port with the western Amazon. 

If so, these investments could have multidimensional impacts on the 2.7 million-square-mile rainforest that serves as a critical global carbon sink, says Humphreys Bebbington, a founding member of Extractives@Clark<\/a> (the Clark Center for the Study of Natural Resources Extraction and Society).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe are investigating what the port\u2019s implications might be in the western Amazon,\u201d Humphreys Bebbington says, \u201cand whether it might act as a catalyst for deforestation, habitat loss, and expansion of gold mining  and other extractive activities in remote areas.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Besides Humphreys Bebbington, the Clark team includes Geography Professor John Rogan; Peru-based project manager and field research coordinator\u00a0Pilar Delpino Marim\u00f3n, Ph.D. \u201925;\u00a0Tanner Honnef \u201924, M.S.\/GIS \u201925, who began the mapping project that Head now continues; Fulbright Fellow\u00a0Vee Dayandayan, M.S.\/ID \u201925; and Ana Luc\u00eda Araujo Raurau, a Ph.D. student in geography from Peru and expert on Indigenous cultures. Araujo spent 1-1\/2 months last summer interviewing community members and tradespeople in Peru\u2019s\u00a0Atalaya Province, part of the\u00a0central Amazon rainforest.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe\u2019re trying to create an infrastructure by which things can be monitored, analyzed, and disseminated to the public, which currently is not happening,\u201d Humphreys Bebbington explains.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The GIS maps, for example, will help the public visually conceptualize the port\u2019s potential impacts \u2014 and even pinpoint borders. \u201cA lot of people don\u2019t realize where the boundary of the Amazon starts,\u201d according to Head. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now a GIS specialist with Liberty Utilities in California, Honnef \u201ccreated maps of potential shipping routes from the Amazon to the Peruvian coast, along with biodiversity maps to show the potential impacts of increased traffic on the environment,\u201d he says. \u201cThose making decisions need to be able to understand the analysis, even if they do not have a background in spatial analysis.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n
\n
\"Deforestation
GIS map showing the Infrastructure projects being tracked by the research team, as well as deforestation between 2000 and 2024;<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
\n
\"Map
\u00a0GIS map depicting the proposed Brazilian integration routes, protected territories, and the Chancay port.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Undeveloped roadways leading to the Amazon: \u2018We should look into this\u2019<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Part of China\u2019s sweeping Belt and Road Initiative, the port continues to receive support from Peru\u2019s government, which hopes the development will spur economic growth. In 2024, Chinese leader Xi Jinping and then-Peruvian president Dina Boluarte attended the port\u2019s inauguration, commemorating the completion of its first phase. Peru has cycled through two leaders since then; as of February, Jos\u00e9 Mar\u00eda Balc\u00e1zar was the interim president, with elections scheduled for April 12. Because of problems with the ballot-delivery system, the election results were not known before this story was posted.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Clark researchers have teamed up with Peruvian partner C\u00e9sar Le\u00f3nidas Gamboa Balb\u00edn, a lawyer and executive director of the NGO, and Extractives@Clark is partnering with Derecho, Ambiente y Recursos Naturales<\/em> (DAR), or Law, Environment, and Natural Resources<\/a>, and the Center for the Study of China and Asia\/Pacific<\/a> (CECHAP) at the Universidad del P\u00e1cifico<\/em>. Cesar Gamboa coordinates the work of the DAR team and Omar Narrea coordinates the work of the CECHAP researchers, which includes Leolino Dourado. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Pilar
Pilar Delpino Marim\u00f3n, Ph.D. \u201925<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Humphreys Bebbington credits Delpino with inspiring the project. Delpino\u2019s dissertation focused on the effects of the proposed Pucallpa-Cruzeiro do Sul road between Peru and Brazil, part of \u201ca regional integration strategy from the early 2000s, but dating back to the early 1900s,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As Delpino researched the history and effects of unbuilt infrastructure projects and conducted fieldwork in these borderland areas, she heard from residents who feared that \u201cwe\u2019ll connect with Chancay,\u201d she recalls.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cA light bulb went off\u201d as she realized that the stagnated road building projects eventually might be restarted, potentially leading to more development in the Amazon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe should look into this,\u201d she told her research partners at Clark. \u201cAnd here we are still talking about it.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As Delpino soon discovered, Peru\u2019s large-scale infrastructure projects lack \u201clong-term planning,\u201d which is exacerbated by unstable, rotating government leadership. Without a plan, she adds, \u201cthere\u2019s a lack of the safeguards and considerations that you need to take into account to access these sensitive ecological and political spaces,\u201d where Indigenous communities and isolated populations live in the rainforest, travel and fish on the rivers, and often play a role in helping protect the ecologically significant Amazon basin.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"A
Researchers from Clark and Peru are investigating the implications of the Port of Chancay in the western Amazon. The team has released its first report in Spanish.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Recently, the research team released its first report in Spanish, which has drawn media attention in South America. Soon, they plan to release an English-language translation, followed by additional publications in both languages over the next year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The reports will include the GIS maps developed by Head and Honnef, under Rogan\u2019s and Delpino\u2019s guidance, along with research data from Humphreys Bebbington, Delpino, Araujo, and their partners in Peru.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe\u2019re putting together the pieces of a complex puzzle,\u201d Humphreys Bebbington says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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